(20) The Christ of God.--This precise form of expression is peculiar to St. Luke. It agrees substantially with "the Lord's Christ" of the song of Simeon (Luke 2:26).

Verse 20. - But whom say ye that I am Peter answering said, The Christ of God. And the Master listened, apparently without comment, to this reply, which told him what the people said of him, and then went on, "But you, my disciples, who have been ever with he, what say, what think you about me?" Peter, as the representative of the others in that little chosen company, answers, "We believe that thou art more than any prophet or national hero or forerunner of the Messiah; we think that thou art the Messiah himself."' Dr. Morrison very beautifully pictures the disciples' state of mind at this juncture. "No doubt the true light on the subject had often gleamed through the darkness of their minds (see John 1:29, 33, 34, 41, 45, 49, etc.). But, though gleam succeeded gleam, in flashes that revealed the Illimitable, the darkness would ever, more or less, close in again. They could not altogether help it. They were witnesses of a 'humiliation' which they could not reconcile with the notions they had inherited in reference to the power and pomp of the Messiah. And yet it was evident that he was entirely unlike all other rabbis. He was the Master of masters, and a mystery over and above. An inner lustre was continually breaking through. It was glorious; it was unique. His character was transcendently noble and pure. He had not, moreover, obtruded self-assertions on them. He had left them, in a great measure, to observe for themselves; and they had been observing." It was, indeed, on the part of these feeble disciples a pure and lofty expression of the effect produced on their hearts by Jesus Christ's teaching. But though these men, afterwards so great, had attained to this grand conception of their adored Master, though they alone, among the crowds, through the sad coloured veil of his low estate, could see shining the glory of Divinity, yet they could not grasp yet the conception of a suffering Messiah, and in spite of all the teaching of the Master, the cross and the Passion made them unbelievers again. It needed the Resurrection to complete the education of faith.

9:18-27 It is an unspeakable comfort that our Lord Jesus is God's Anointed; this signifies that he was both appointed to be the Messiah, and qualified for it. Jesus discourses concerning his own sufferings and death. And so far must his disciples be from thinking how to prevent his sufferings, that they must prepare for their own. We often meet with crosses in the way of duty; and though we must not pull them upon our own heads, yet, when they are laid for us, we must take them up, and carry them after Christ. It is well or ill with us, according as it is well or ill with our souls. The body cannot be happy, if the soul be miserable in the other world; but the soul may be happy, though the body is greatly afflicted and oppressed in this world. We must never be ashamed of Christ and his gospel.He said unto them, but whom say ye that I am?.... Which was the main thing he had in view in this private conference; and in order to introduce which, he puts the former question:

Peter answering: in the name of the rest of the disciples, they assenting to it:

said, the Christ of God; The Persic version reads, "Christ God"; the Messiah, who is the Son of God, and God over all, blessed for ever. The Cambridge copy of Beza's reads, "the Christ, the Son of God". See Gill on Luke 2:26.